’Her mind was sufficiently unoccupied to delight in my warm devotion.  She could not know what it was to me, but the light cast by the flame through so delicate a vase cheered and charmed her.  All who saw admired her in their way; but she would lightly turn her head from their hard or oppressive looks, and fix a glance of full-eyed sweetness on the child, who, from a distance, watched all her looks and motions.  She did not say much to me—­not much to any one; she spoke in her whole being rather than by chosen words.  Indeed, her proper speech was dance or song, and what was less expressive did not greatly interest her.  But she saw much, having in its perfection the woman’s delicate sense for sympathies and attractions.  We walked in the fields, alone.  Though others were present, her eyes were gliding over all the field and plain for the objects of beauty to which she was of kin.  She was not cold to her seeming companions; a sweet courtesy satisfied them, but it hung about her like her mantle that she wore without thinking of it; her thoughts were free, for these civilized beings can really live two lives at the same moment.  With them she seemed to be, but her hand was given to the child at her side; others did not observe me, but to her I was the only human presence.  Like a guardian spirit she led me through the fields and groves, and every tree, every bird greeted me, and said, what I felt, “She is the first angel of your life.”

’One time I had been passing the afternoon with her.  She had been playing to me on the harp, and I sat listening in happiness almost unbearable.  Some guests were announced.  She went into another room to receive them, and I took up her book.  It was Guy Mannering, then lately published, and the first of Scott’s novels I had ever seen.  I opened where her mark lay, and read merely with the feeling of continuing our mutual existence by passing my eyes over the same page where hers had been.  It was the description of the rocks on the sea-coast where the little Harry Bertram was lost.  I had never seen such places, and my mind was vividly stirred to imagine them.  The scene rose before me, very unlike reality, doubtless, but majestic and wild.  I was the little Harry Bertram, and had lost her,—­all I had to lose,—­and sought her vainly in long dark caves that had no end, plashing through the water; while the crags beetled above, threatening to fall and crush the poor child.  Absorbed in the painful vision, tears rolled down my cheeks.  Just then she entered with light step, and full-beaming eye.  When she saw me thus, a soft cloud stole over her face, and clothed every feature with a lovelier tenderness than I had seen there before.  She did not question, but fixed on me inquiring looks of beautiful love.  I laid my head against her shoulder and wept,—­dimly feeling that